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Teenage Christmas
I don’t visit my parents for Christmas
anymore. They live in northern Wisconsin, and
it’s just too cold there this time of year.
But I think of them every Christmas. And I remember
all the Christmas Days I spent with my family as a
child.
In my early years Christmas was full of fun and
magic. My parents could WOW me every year with a
battery-powered car, a three speed bike, a pair of
skis or such. As I grew older I still cherished the
excitement of Christmas, even though my expanding
appetite for expensive gifts grew too large to be
satisfied on my father’s salary. When there
was nothing left under the tree but a white sheet
sprinkled with pine needles I remember secretly
thinking, “Is that all?”
But in the last few years that I lived at home I
struggled even more with the Christmas spirit. I
wanted to believe in the joy of giving, but the
rampant greed and hypocrisy of the adult world I
was entering was hard to reconcile. I had learned
too much to believe in magic. I was bitter,
disillusioned and only seventeen years old.
Nothing my parents could buy for me could even
touch my pain. I wanted a world where war was not
an option, where the earth was not being raped, and
where purported Christians did not hoard great
wealth five blocks away from neighbors who lived in
poverty. How could we all celebrate Jesus’
birth so religiously when no one seemed to actually
believe in his teachings any more than they
believed in Santa Claus.
I felt betrayed. I had been taught that I could
help make the world a better place. The American
values of liberty, justice and equality would
supposedly support me. Instead, I was being handed
a world that seemed hopelessly screwed up. Further,
my parents and teachers did not appreciate my
criticism. It was my negative attitude, they said,
that was the problem.
Underneath it all, I was terribly lonely. I
didn’t know it at the time. And no one else
guessed either.
Then one Christmas my Uncle Henry came to visit.
Uncle Henry is my mother’s brother. He taught
history at a college in New York. He had a
reputation as kind of an “absent-minded
professor”. I had heard many jokes about his
numerous embarrassing social faux pas’. But it
had been about six years since I had actually seen
him.
On Christmas Eve he followed me when I left the
dinner table after scarfing down my food. The rest
of the adults were drinking wine and happily
discussing matters that seemed to be important to
them. I plopped down on the couch in the TV room
and Uncle Henry sat down beside me. It was kind of
strange having an adult follow me. I hesitated to
turn on the TV, so I could figure out what he
wanted.
He began to ask me questions. Big questions.
What I thought about the world, my future, my
friends, the meaning of life. He seemed excited by
every answer I gave, no matter how inarticulate. I
was anticipating a lecture from him in response to
some of the more controversial points I made, but
none came. My plans to become a hippy on Vancouver
Island sounded intriguing to him. I told him my
view that no one should have more than ten times
the wealth of the poorest person on earth. He
thought the idea was worth seriously considering.
As the conversation progressed I began to trust
that his agenda was just to get to know his nephew,
nothing more. We talked all evening. The attention
he gave me was intoxicating. I felt important. My
ideas were legitimate. My feelings made sense.
The next day was Christmas. Uncle Henry suffered
the embarrassment of receiving a present from each
of us when he had not been able to do any shopping
himself. He was grading papers, he feebly
explained, right up to the time his plane left New
York. In his defense, I announced that he had given
me his present last night. All eyes turned to me,
expecting me to describe the alleged gift, if in
fact it did exist. I just winked at Uncle Henry. He
smiled back at me. No one knew what to say. So
finally someone grabbed another gift from under the
tree. And Christmas continued.
© 2007, Tim
Hartnett
Other Father Issues,
Books
* * *
Your children need your presence more than your
presents. - Jesse Jackson
Tim
Hartnett, Ph.D. is a licensed Marriage and Family
Therapist in private practice in Santa Cruz, CA. He
specializes in Individual Counseling, Couples
Therapy, and Divorce Mediation. He can be reached
at 831.464.2922 or through his website:
www.TimHartnett.com
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